Water utilities, forest landowners join forces to protect water quality
A new project managed by the U.S. Endowment for Forestry and Communities and supported by a grant from the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI) will engage forest landowners and water utilities to support innovative ways to promote watershed protection and maintenance on privately owned forest lands.
 |
|
Credit: Petritap/Wikimedia Commons |
The U.S. Forest Service estimates that about two-thirds of our nation's freshwater resources originate in forests and experts acknowledge the important role forestlands play in protecting the nation's water quality. Water utilities are increasingly taking responsibility for the health of local watersheds as the best way to ensure a long-term supply of clean water for the community.
"The most cost-effective way for a community to ensure clean water is to maintain their watershed in a healthy, forested area," said Kathy Abusow, president and CEO of SFI. "We're excited to support new tools that encourage forest owners and water utilities to work together to conserve watersheds. This project will provide us with a greater understanding of what is needed to advance watershed protection
The SFI Conservation Grant will help the Endowment educate community stakeholders, water utilities and landowners and ultimately develop a financial instrument that will compensate forest landowners for protecting and maintaining the health of the watershed they manage. One example of this approach has been implemented in Raleigh, North Carolina. In 2011, Raleigh established a "watershed protection fee" of 1 cent per 100 gallons, included in customers' monthly water bills. The fee costs homeowners an average of 40 cents per month and generates about $1.8 million annually for land protection and management to protect drinking water quality.
This grant builds on SFI's conservation grants awarded in 2012 to the World Resources Institute to examine how SFI requirements related to best management practices result in improvements in water quality, and to the National Association of State Foresters to assess development and implementation of best management practices in all U.S. states and territories.
In 2010, SFI Inc. first invested $400,000 to create the SFI Conservation and Community Partnerships Grant Program to foster partnerships and conservation research that improve forest management in the United States and Canada, and responsible procurement globally. In a few short years, by leveraging partner contributions, SFI has achieved a total investment of $4.8 million in conservation partnerships and research, supporting more than 40 grants with 150 partners across North America.
For more:
- visit this website
Related Article:
American Water preparing for next 100-year event
Sign up for our FREE newsletter for more news like this sent to your inbox!
© 2013 FierceMarkets. All rights reserved. http://www.fierceenergy.com